Editor: When Jack Kelly retired after 47 years as a Scranton Times employee, I told people we were losing a person I considered the consummate newspaper man.

During my many years at The Scranton Tribune/Scrantonian, Jack and I occasionally crossed paths while covering athletic events. I felt we had a relationship I would describe as “very pleasant,” especially for two guys working on opposite sides of the street at a time when competition was at a high level.

Jack was a very talented and dedicated sports writer. We were so fortunate to have had someone of his ilk in our midst all those years.

GUY M. VALVANO

DUNMORE

Editor’s Note: Mr. Kelly, a longtime reporter and editor for The Scranton Times, died this week.

n Since Wilkes-Barre is half the size of Scranton, the proper name is not Wilkes-Barre/Scranton.

n With about one foreign flight every 10 years, it’s not an “international” airport. This term was a funding ruse designed by Mr. Corruption, Rep. Dan Flood.

n The backwards name was not chosen by the federal government (which would imply an approval), nor was there public input. Flood rammed the legislation through Congress in 1947, most likely onto an unrelated bill, a practice that helped end his career.

n Two decades ago the one word that summed up all that was low-class about Northeast Pennsylvania was “hayna.” In that time, hayna has been supplanted by the even more uneducated phrase “Wilkes-Barre/Scranton.” Perhaps we should call the airport “Hayna International,” a distinct improvement.

n No other airport in the world is named backwards. Our region is a global leader.

n Flood probably cleaned up from naming the airport in such irrational fashion. This old money had been working diligently since the 1850s when it attempted to rig the state constitution to prevent Lackawanna County from breaking off from Luzerne. Today this slush fund specializes in wooing media outlets from Scranton to Wilkes-Barre, under cover of the stolen airport and media-market names. These names weren’t earned. They were bought.

MIKE O’HARA

SCRANTON

Don’t forget Ivan

Editor: So. How many people are aware that the water off Omaha beach was so thick with corpses that you practically could imitate Jesus and walk on the surface of the sea?

Without meaning to diminish the sacrifices made by American, British and other Allied soldiers, we need to remember that if it were not for the Russian Army, and hard-fought victories at places like Stalingrad and Kursk, there would have been no Normandy invasion.

Also, we need to keep in mind that, in any of the armies involved in the war, a large percentage of the troops were draftees.

So the average Joe was not given a lot of choice in the matter of whether or not he wanted to be a “hero.”

JEFFREY McHALE

SCRANTON

Cut time, add jobs

Editor: Two centuries ago 70 percent of Americans lived on farms. Automation has eliminated most of these jobs. Before this century ends, 70 percent of today’s jobs will be eliminated.

Many new occupations have been and will be created. It remains to be seen if our society will prepare people with the necessary skills and how open access to these jobs will be. For now we have far too many people to work 40 hours on necessary jobs.

The 40-hour week is over 100 years old. To create jobs for all who wish to work it should be reduced to 30 hours or less. It could be reduced by an hour every few years and enforced by mandating double time for all work over the minimum.

The large worker surplus has resulted in major imbalances in our economy and in the function of our democratic republic. Among these:

n The number of workers represented by unions has dropped, resulting in lower wages and benefits.

n Corporations are able to use jobs as a lever to gain benefits from states and cities competing for these jobs.

n Lawmakers have legislated against the nation’s interests to preserve jobs in their districts. The military is getting $700 billion in planes it doesn’t want because the manufacturer has assembled suppliers from 40 states.

n Almost any economic activity is welcome if it creates jobs. States are promoting gambling, damage to the environment is overlooked, marijuana use is promoted — anything to create jobs.

There is also a troubling societal danger. As the group of people actually running the economy becomes smaller and more select, the much larger remnant becomes less necessary. This approaches the situation in Kurt Vonnegut’s “Player Piano,” where a select small privileged group did all of the nation’s work and the rest of the people were retained as non-working consumers.

Many workers do not want their hours cut and employers do not want to pay for a shorter work week but if we want a society in which everyone contributes we must lower the work week.

AL ROGERS

CLARKS SUMMIT

Progress in picture

Editor: Thank you, Times-Tribune, for showing the picture of the two young ladies getting married. This is an example of how our society is becoming sensitized to those citizens that live a lifestyle that is not “traditional.”

We have seen examples of these changes in society. Television programs with gay leading characters. Commercials with interracial and gay couples.

Recently, on a popular game show, a contestant spoke about her fiance, another woman.

We have a long way to go to a time when these subjects are no longer topics of discussion and the word “traditional” is no longer needed.

I recall the furor over the Cheerios commercial that had an interracial couple with a young daughter. I am no psychologist, but it seems to me that the people fighting same-sex marriage are individuals who see their traditional way of beliefs disappearing in our society.

In a number of cases that I have observed in different types of media, the fear of loss comes out as hatred. Thank you again, Times-Tribune, for furthering our concept of what will be considered normal.

DENNIS BRYON

BLAKELY

Selective spin

Editor: Odd that I have seen so many statements in the press attributed to Pope Francis that are open to progressive spin but I don’t recall seeing the following: Pope Francis recently said, “The image of God is the married couple: the man and the woman; not only the man, not only the woman, but both of them together. This is the image of God: love, God’s covenant with us is represented in that covenant between man and woman. And this is very beautiful.” Does this not mesh with your editorial position?

Also, I have not seen a report about Theresa Gaffney, Clerk of the Orphan’s Court of Schuylkill County, who is filing a motion to intervene in the recent federal district case that declared unconstitutional the law defining marriage between one man and one woman.

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